SO, I am not the tidiest of people. Fine, I'm a mess. Blame it on the ADHD! And the fact that my parents never taught me to clean up after myself, because they were never around and we had this creepy housekeeper named Nang who shuffled around in dirty slippers sort of following you all the time -- (THUNK) OW! JESUS! (rubs head) It seems I've been smacked on the head with a violin! By some invisible hand of God!

It happens to me a lot.

Anyway. I don't clean very well after work, which is the only time besides weekends (when I'm not home, and instead out acting the fool in some sort of slaggy shredded miniskirt and, say, a leather bra under an Alexander Wang dumpster smock) that I have to work on pulling my apartment together. My mess is all clothes, beauty products, books and magazines. It is significant, and it never really goes away.

But I'm off track again, because I can never just write a damn article without blabbering on about my stupid self as though everyone cares! I need a therapist, because then I wouldn't be so compelled to dump everything on you all. (See, even there -- do you care that I need a therapist? No! Shut UP, Marnell.)

OK, the new study -- and I'm just lifting the text, lazily and exactly, because I suck at paraphrasing and whatever STOP TALKING ABOUT YOURSELF -- has just been published in the Journal of Family Psychology, and it claims that "for both men and women" -- for some reason, I resent the suggestion that this "cleaning isn't relaxing" study WOULDN'T also apply to females, but anyway -- "cleaning up when you get home prevents the body from reducing its levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which is a bad thing when you're supposed to be unwinding."

RIGHT! I knew that there was a reason that cleaning my oven after I got home from xojane.com HQ always makes me want to stick my head directly INTO it! (Joking; as if I actually clean my oven. Peace. I keep magazines in it.)

What else does the study say? So cleaning at night prevents our cortisol levels from dropping at night, and that's bad because "our bodies do not respond well to having it at peak production levels all the time; after peaking during the day, cortisol is supposed to drop in the evening."

The long-term consequences? "Consistently high cortisol levels appear to lower our resistance to physical ailments, and some studies have suggested that they can even lead to early death."

Death due to cleaning at night? PAUSE. I cannot THINK of anything more wack. I'll never clean again!

Fine, ooh, OK; actually I will. Can I just interject right here with a cleaning product line I'm totally obsessed with? It's called Bon Ami, and they have baby chicks on them! And they're totally wonderful-looking AND they work! I like the Powder Cleanser best, which is just like that other famous cleaning product you sprinkle around on your sink or whatever -- honestly, I cannot for my life remember what it's called -- and then you scrub everything down. I LOVE using Bon Ami; it puts me in such a good mood. The powder above has odor-absorbing baking soda, plus cleaning agents like limestone and coconut oil -- who knew? -- and is all-natural yet effectively abrasive and scrubby. OBSESSED.

So, I'll clean a little. I wish I did it more, you guys. I HATE my house being wrecked all the time. Is anyone else out there really messy? What's wrong with me? What do you do or not do at night to keep your life in order? I need advice and I need it now.